Innovation and creativity in city-regions

The processes of globalization that have unfolded at an accelerating pace in recent decades have raised important questions about the value of proximity in a digital economy. Yet, innovation and creativity overwhelmingly occur in the geographic context of city-regions, which are consequently critical sites for determining economic performance. Thus, many aspects of the trend towards globalization make cities more, not less, important as principal sites for innovation, creativity and the production of knowledge intensive goods and services.This chapter surveys some of the evidence on the virtues of economic specialization versus diversity for urban economic growth; the emergence of a global hierarchy of cities around the world with ever more differentiated economic roles; the relative importance of greater concentrations of highly skilled and creative workers as attractors for firms and industries; and the relationship between creative occupations and creative industries as drivers of urban economic growth.